


Thin Ice

by shutupeccles



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-02
Updated: 2011-12-02
Packaged: 2017-11-04 10:02:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/392600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shutupeccles/pseuds/shutupeccles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Morgana shuns Agravaine’s advances until she understands why he truly supports the bastard daughter of his enemy rather than the legitimate son of his sister.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Thin Ice

**Author's Note:**

> Prompts provided by **frankiealton** : ice skating, and naughty or nice

Must she endure another winter in this wretched place?  
   
Morgana should be in the castle at the heart of Camelot, surrounded by servants and loyal citizens, with a wealth of gowns to choose each of her moods, freeing those enslaved by fear of their own magical abilities. _What will it take to rid my lands of that usurper?_  
   
She no longer spoke the usurper’s name. How dare he sit upon that throne when he knew she lived, that she was the elder, rightful heir?  
   
“Camelot is mine!” Morgana shouted to the insensitive sky as the first snow began to fall. The birds at least had courtesy to take flight. Morgana turned her bitter gaze to the hovel that had become her centre of power and began to build an illusion with gestures and words. It still felt like a tiny shelter carved into a hillside, for that was what it was, but now it appeared to be a fine stone house with wooden eaves and window frames, a home instead of a hiding place. A few changes here and there and it would be a small replica of the house of Gorlois, the only home in which Morgana had been happy.  
   
Then Agravaine had to come along on his horse and ruin everything.  
   
“My Lady, why torture yourself by rebuilding these memories?”  
   
“These memories are all I have left of people and a life I love. Surely you understand that.”  
   
This was the majority of her hold over Agravaine. He lost his beloved younger sister because Morgana’s father, Uther Pendragon, insisted on having a legitimate male heir rather than acknowledge the existing illegitimate female one. Morgana could bring Ygraine back through the veil of the Spirit World, in theory. If the return of Ygraine Du Bois proved successful then the life of Gorlois could be restored. The usurper would be dead, Morgana would be Queen, and Gorlois would be proud to call her daughter.  
   
Agravaine sought the aid of Morgause years before she came to Camelot to challenge his nephew. Morgause had the knowledge, but not the power. Morgana would, someday. The usurper would not have lived without the interference that took his mother’s life so Agravaine did not see his death as a sacrifice, but as justice.  
   
Similar opinions aside, Agravaine was clearly besotted with Morgana. _Old enough to be my father, as though they were not in excess already._ Her bitterness turned the illusion sour.  
   
Agravaine’s voice was cautiously smooth and he took a slow step forward in an attempt to comfort her. “My Lady, soon you will have achieved your goal. Then new memories of home and hearth can be made and treasured. Do not lose focus by dwelling in the past.”  
   
“What can you know of misery?” Morgana asked spitefully.  
   
“You underestimate my grief, Morgana.” Agravaine began to pace, sedately at first to match his deliberately calm exterior then quickening as emotions boiled. “Ygraine’s dream from an early age was not to be queen, but to be a mother. She adored children, all her life. My wife had taken ill and died without conceiving. Mother was as desperate for a grandchild as Ygraine was eager to provide one. Uther played upon her latent yearnings, convinced her sorcery was the only way to fulfil her dream and retain the peace and stability they’d established in Camelot –Not he alone Morgana, **they**.” He turned with an angry swirl of cloak and twist of foot that were also elegant, like a dance. His sneer was familiar. The usurper’s temper did not come from the patriarchal line at all. This knowledge surprised Morgana. Agravaine did not notice. “Ygraine’s death robbed our mother of her sanity. **How** , how could her daughter remain robust and healthy throughout a trouble-free pregnancy and the onset of labour, only to die once the child was placed in Ygraine’s expectant embrace, unless that yowling brat sucked the life out of her? Mother felt cursed and refused to eat, thinking that would starve whatever demon plagued her. She could not face the world or bear to be seen and did nothing but wail until grief took her to her grave.” Agravaine’s face became red as a robin’s breast. “Then Tristan, so like Ygraine to look at and barely old enough to shave, rode to Camelot as I dealt with the legalities of our mother’s death. Did Uther show compassion for a young brother’s grief? Did he extend mercy when he clearly had the upper hand? **NO!** ” Agravaine’s wrath reached its crescendo. His voice echoed through the narrow valley and every living thing fled his fury, all but Morgana who felt it knit with hers. “Tristan was little more than a boy and that monster BUTCHERED HIM! I will not rest until the life brought forth is exchanged for the three lives taken. If bathing in Arthur’s blood will restore my sister to me then **I will do so**.”  
   
“Some say he resembles her, in more than his pretty face.” Morgana said it calmly, coldly. Despite Agravaine’s heated words there remained the slimmest chance that he would let that likeness stay his hand at the crucial moment. Indeed, perhaps that is why his nephew still lived. Morgana needed to be sure Agravaine’s hatred of Uther outweighed her own.  
   
“Not as closely as Tristan did. If Arthur had been raised by Ygraine then he would have her heart as well as her fair hair and blue eyes. What little he gained from his mother is tainted by Uther’s influence. He is ruined. An abomination created by sorcery rather than nature. He should never have existed.”  
   
Agravaine’s passion enflamed Morgana. He understood the importance of balance, justice, and the proper order. Her grief and thirst for revenge were immature compared with Agravaine’s. She had underestimated the man, and could learn from him after all. Morgana stepped forward and placed a soothing hand on Agravaine’s cheek. The skin burned as hot as it appeared.  
   
“Shh,” she said soothingly and without condescension. “The debt will be repaid and our revenge on Uther will be all the sweeter, because Arthur would freely exchange his life for Ygraine’s.”  
   
Morgause had mentioned his emotional reaction to the illusion of his mother, how readily he had expressed guilt at causing her death and believed everything the vision told him. Arthur would give his life for any that he loved. Morgana swept aside the spark of thought that he had loved her once, as friend and ally as well as a sister, because it was true no longer. Knowing she was the true Pendragon heir, her only remaining blood relative would hunt her down and kill her to secure his place on her throne.  
   
 _No he wouldn’t_. The cursed voice of Emrys spoke through her thoughts. To banish her foe, Morgana touched her lips to Agravaine’s.  
   
He retreated in astonishment, hands on her wrists. “My Lady!”  
   
“Shh,” she repeated. “You have proven your commitment to our cause. I should never have doubted you.” Her repeat advance was also rebuked.  
   
“Do not toy with me, Morgana,” Agravaine threatened.  
   
Morgana stepped back and he released her wrists. “The time for games between us is over, Lord Agravaine. We have both suffered greatly. Let us leave these morbid histories in peace for a time, as you said, and contemplate a brighter future.”  
   
“For Camelot, or for us?” Agravaine dared to hope. Morgana smiled to nurture that hope.  
   
“The two need not be exclusive. A Queen needs a consort, does she not?” She offered her hands. After some hesitation he took them in his and kissed her knuckles. The aching loneliness fostered from the first moment Morgana suspected she possessed magic lost its sharpness as they walked through the hidden valley as would any normal courting couple. Why had she kept him at such a distance for so long?  
   
“Do you skate my Lady?” he asked as they passed a small pond turned to ice.  
   
“Not since childhood,” Morgana admitted sadly. Those had been wonderful winters when she’d been a girl. _If only I’d understood then, what the world was trying to tell me._ “We will need to fashion skates.” Morgana listened to the rhythms of the earth then directed Agravaine to the skeleton of a large deer and tore strips from her gown to use as laces. Gorlois taught her how to carve the curved bones and attach them to boots. Morgana did it by hand, as he had shown her. Her mother introduced her to the freedom found in dancing on ice before she could stand without assistance. Her fondest memory is of resting warm and cosy in the arms of Gorlois as he exclaimed over her mother’s beauty, and the smile mother gave him because she had heard. _Did he know he had been betrayed? Did he forgive her? Or was his love ignorant?_  
   
Morgana found it difficult to gain her footing with such questions making her stumble. Without a word, Agravaine offered a supporting arm and led her around the ice until she felt confident. He stood at the edge of the snow to watch and Morgana showed off as she had for Gorlois. She circled and twirled at different speeds, leaning back so the wind made a banner of her hair. Nearing exhaustion, she skated to Agravaine and again took his hands.  
   
“I have never seen you more beautiful my Lady,” he said reverently.  
   
“You have given me hope and restored treasured memories from a time of innocence. Priceless gifts indeed.” Morgana smiled and hinted that he should put an arm around her as they walked, which he did. The physical warmth he provided complemented her emotional state. “Emrys may be my doom as the Cailleach said, but I believe you are my destiny.”  
   
“You must be aware that my heart has been yours for some time, Morgana. Now I promise it shall remain so.”  
   
She reinstated the illusion of a noble household once they reached her hiding place, and this time it held until dawn.


End file.
